Music taken to a higher plane

Michael Sieg and chamber players, Christ Church Cathedral, Nelson, Tuesday, January 19.

The word "lifted'' came to mind and stayed from the first bars of the first piece: Mozart's Adagio in C major KV 580a. The elegance and skill of these musicians  Michael Sieg, on oboe and cor anglais, with five other chamber players  lifted their audience to another plane. Nelson's Viva Chamber Orchestra founders, violinist Martin Jaenecke and Victoria Jaenecke, violist, were two of the five.

This was the first of four concerts Sieg, a member of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, performs in Nelson this week, his first since 2003, and his only New Zealand performances.

The haunting clarity of his cor anglais in Alan Ridout's The Rainbow Elegy was a highlight, accompanied by the delicate expressiveness of Victoria Jaenecke, violinist Dianna Cochrane and cellist Robert Ibell. Another was hearing Sieg's oboe d'amore take the lead vocal in Georg Friederich Handel's aria from the Messiah: I Know That My Redeemer Liveth, which showcased the bond between Sieg and Martin Jaenecke, on violin.

Following interval, the two, with Jaenecke on saxophone, further enchanted from the choir loft in a darkened cathedral, with a sublime rendering of Thomas Morley's two-voice canzonets: Leave Now Mine Eyes Lamenting, and In Nets of Golden Wyers.

Donald Nicholson's harpsichord solo, Dietrich Buxtehude's Praeludium in G BuxWV 163 - the "Baroque equivalent of experimental jazz''  was contemplative and cheeky in turn. Then the violin and basso continuo performed a joyous and lively Sonata in A major, by Georg Phillip Telemann. In Joaquin Turina's La oración del torero (The Bullfighter's Prayer), Ibell's cello set the moods  dramatic, poignant and sombre  picked up exquisitely by the other strings.

The shadowy cathedral, with muted red lighting and candles, provided a soiree-like setting in which this small ensemble performed with passion and precision.

The finale of the more reflective Bach Concerto in A Major for oboe d'amore, strings and basso continuo, felt like an anticlimax after the highs of Telemann and Turina. Despite Sieg's glorious playing, especially in the second movement, the audience seemed subdued and no encore was forthcoming. This, however, took nothing away from an experience my friend described as ``divine''. It was a privilege to be there.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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